Wednesday, January 27, 2010

My Kingdom For A Blog Topic

by Suzanne

Yes, I'm desperate, much like Richard III in Shakespeare's play of the same title. Misquoted from almost the day it was posted, often in ridicule, the actual quote is "A horse, a horse. My kingdom for a horse," says a dismounted hunchbacked villain-king Richard III in the midst of battle with the future King Henry VII. So here is this man trying valiantly to get back into the fray at any cost, even if it is his kingdom, which in reality it did cost him.

I use this quote often at work, much to the puzzlement of my co-workers, who have on more than one occasion looked at me with a raised eyebrow and asked me what the heck I was talking about.Another great quote I use to their befuddlement is, "It's always something." I couldn't find a short video on Youtube, but this is still worth watching, and of course Roseanne Roseannadanna (the late comic genius Gilda Radner) uses the "It's always something" line to perfection.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qd_syuD-N_k

Another marvelous quote is "Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first."- Mark Twain. This was one my father sort of used, I think he paraphrased it all sorts of ways, but the message was always clear. Probably why his three children have never been unemployed in 30 years!

One of my favorite people to quote is Yogi Berra, (not to be confused with Yogi Bear, who is a great quote source,too.) Yogi said, "If you come to a fork in the road, take it." Okay, this can be funny, as in an eating utensil in the road. But I think Yogi was actually quite profound with this one. When life gives you a choice, you have to make one, or you end up stranded. Another Yogi-ism, "If you don't know where you are going, you might wind up someplace else." We all know how I have an aversion to the word, G-O-A-L. But on the great road of life, you'd better have travel plans, or you might not get where you want!

Okay...Your turn...what is your favorite quote or quotes? What makes them so great to you? Be prepared, I'll probably dig up a few more to pepper in the comments, too!

This weekend, a friend and I were at a workshop hassling each other other the chocolates scattered about when we both looked at each other and said - "Yeah ... That's the ticket!" Who said that? Wasn't it another from Saturday Night Live?

I keep two quotes on my refrigerator. One from Albert Einstein "Imagination is Everything." The other comes from Helen Keller "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing."

Yup - they're up there next to the magnet that says, "Skinny cooks can't be trusted."

Shakespeare quotes are my favorites, and I'm always shocked when people know the quote but have no idea it is from Shakespeare. :-P My fave is from Twelfth Night: "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatnees thrust up 'em." It always gets a laugh.

Hi Suzanne,I love Yogi and his quotes. One of my favorites from him is "Baseball is ninety percent mental and the other half is physical." I also love Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Nobody can bring you peace but yourself."

Congrats Mariska he is really loving visiting you lately have fun with him

Great quotes Suz

I always read the quotes on my desk top calender at work and there are some excellent ones but my memory is really bad and I never remember them or who said them LOL.

One my Mum always said was "treat people how you would liked to be treated yourself" and I really try to stick by that one and another one when things are going bad "every cloud has a silver lining" and "there are always people worse off than yourself"I have now idea who origanlly said them I am sure someone will know.

Great post Suz - love the quotes. I'm terrible at remembering them. I like anything that encourages people to follow their dreams and reach for the stars.

My favourite quotes giggle is the contradiction of two favourite quotes:

If at first you don't succeed, try, try and try again (some Scotsman *g*)

There is no try, only do (Master Yoda)

I also like the one by Thomas Edison in response to it taking 100 attempts to get the lightbulb right - he said something along the lines of I didn't fail 99 times, I just found 99 ways that didn't work.

I also like anything that talks about not giving up - because the only way to succeed is to keep on trying. In our game, that's key!

I only have one quote in my office - sent to me by a very dear friend - and it says "One shoe can change your life" Cinderella!

I love quotes too, but this one is my favorite. "All the girls I ever danced with thought they couldn't do it, but of course they could. So they always cried. All except Ginger. No no, Ginger never cried." - Fred AstaireIt's not really short and pithy, but it's something I always tell myself when I just need to keep going. Ginger Rodgers made dancing with Fred Astaire look delightful and easy, but clearly it wasn't always! I just tell myself "Ginger never cried." Which I'm sure if I ever said out loud, I'd get a lot of strange looks :-)I also love "Wildflowers don't care where they grow" from the old song from Dolly Parton. I've moved my whole life so that one is also a personal motto.

That was John Lovitz and yes it was from a Saturday Night Live sketch. I think my husband used that line for years! And I love the skinny cooks quote. I mean geesh, how many times do you see cooks on the cooking competition shows get nailed on seasoning, because they never tasted the food as it cooked?

Hey Christine! Your parents must've been as addicted to Get Smart as much as my husband. He's quoted that show for so long to one of my kids, that she bought him the first two seasons on DVD for Christmas.

"The Americans have fuel to fly chocolate cake across the Atlantic. They have no concept of failure." --- The words of a German officer from the WWII film "The Battle of the Bulge"...I love this part of that movie. The British Actor Robert Shaw played the German Tank commander I believe who said this, didn't he?

I also love Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Nobody can bring you peace but yourself."...reminds me of something my aunt used to tell my sister when she'd whine about being bored. She'd tell her, "You need to go grow your own garden." To which Sami would say, "I don't want to garden, I want to do something fun!" :)

Someone's always teasing me about my penchant for quotes. The ones I actually use in conversation the most are from my mother. Some favorites are, "If you're waiting for fair, you'll grow moss" and "It's surprising how a smile changes things."

I just posted a favorite from Anne Lamott on another blog: "Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor."

Another favorite is from Madeleine L'Engle: "Stories make us more alive, more human, more courageous, more loving."

Suz, another Yogi Berra quote is "It ain't over 'til it's over," which is so vague as to apply to almost any situation. As in, the quest to sell a book ain't over 'til the author quits trying.

We're very fond of Murphy's Law: Whatever can go wrong will go wrong and at the worst possible time (corollary: and in the worst possible way).

I also like the quote A. C. Crispin, one of the founders of Writer Beware, drums into her writing students. She attributes it to someone else--maybe SF writer Theodore Sturgeon: "Money flows to the writer."

While not one of my favorites, it's rather appropriate since I'm working on my taxes. I'm not sure which I would prefer right now. I getting everything to together and actually seeing how much money I didn't make this year.

But who prays for Satan? Who in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?

And also Shakespeare's:

I do love nothing in the world so well as you: is not that strange?

And many, many others. *LOL*

Men are like fine wine. They all start out like grapes, and it's our job to stomp on them and keep them in the dark until they mature into something you'd like to have dinner with. --not sure who said that, but she was brilliant.

One of my favorite Shakespeare quotes is "I do love nothing in the world so well as you" from All's Well That Ends Well. I keep reminding my husband of that quote, which I had calligraphied and framed one anniversary.

Men are like fine wine. They all start out like grapes, and it's our job to stomp on them and keep them in the dark until they mature into something you'd like to have dinner with. --not sure who said that, but she was brilliant....I've heard this before and for some reason I want to attribute it to Sophia Loren, but I could be very wrong!

Hey, Mariska, he must have been missing you. I wonder if he behaved for Laurie!

Suz, what a great post. I love quotes. I actually collect them! One of my favorites is "There's no such thing as a free lunch" - Twain again, or so I've always believed. "You can't eat scenery" - Twain. Oh, dear, I'm coming out as a bit of a Twain junkie. Better find another source. "The heart has its reasons which the reason cannot know" - Pascal. Could go on and on, but will stop there! Want to see what everyone else came up with.

Christine, "Good thinking, 99," seems to have entered my vocab. And unless you know Get Smart, that can sound rather bizarre.

"Missed it by THAT much." Hmm, that's a Bandita regular, you're right.

Jill, love Ginger and Fred quotes. I love the one about "Ginger did everything Fred did except backwards and in high heels." That's kind of empowering for a woman! And there's the wonderful one about she gave him sex and he gave her class. Actually I'm not sure if this is word for word, but the MGM executive who saw Fred's screen test said, "Balding, can't act, can't sing, can dance a little." Love that!

Okay, this one has always cracked me up and it's from Eleanor Roosevelt: "I once had a rose named after me and I was very flattered. But I was not pleased to read the description in the catalogue: no good in a bed, but fine up against a wall."

I am a Minister of the Word in our parish and am currently preparing to do a scripture reading on Sunday. My reading is from the first Letter from Saint Paul to the Corinthians. A small part of that reading is in my mind and in my heart. It is "If I have all faith so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing." Love is all and everything to me!

Anna C. said: "Don't tell me the moon was shining. Show me the glint of light on broken glass." Anton Chekhov. There's a whole book worth of writing lessons in that!

Terri said: Much prettier way to say "show don't tell."

Exactly! Showing or painting pictures with words....This is the lesson I've been teaching in language today using the picture book SNOWFLAKE BENTLEY. Instead of writing, "It was a dark night," J.B. Martin wrote, "Farmers cut the dark with lantern light."

This is a good sentence one of my girls came up with: Ribbons of orange and pink streaked through the sky at sunset. Ooh, yeah!

Actually I remember talking to wonderful Anne Gracie about that Chekhov quote and saying how much I love it. And she said - and I think this is really interesting - the reason it's so evocative is that "the moon is shining" is a statement of fact. The broken glass bit is a STORY! Something has happened and something more is about to follow! Isn't that clever? I think she's right.

Jill, I loved the "Ginger never cried" quote! I wonder if Fred Astaire overawed all these women? That's one of the hardest things to overcome isn't it--the fear of not being able to do it. So when I'm stuck with writing I'm going to mutter: "Ginger never cried." *G*

Great topic, Suz! Here are two of my favorites:"Life is a great big canvas, and you should throw all the paint you can on it." --Danny Kaye

Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming 'WOW!! What a Ride!'"Author Unknown

"I do not think I shall ever forget the sight of Etna at sunset; the mountain almost invisible in a blur of pastel grey, glowing on the top and then repeating its shape, as though reflected, in a wisp of grey smoke with the whole horizon behind radiant with pink light, fading gently into a grey pastel sky. Nothing I have seen in Art or Nature was quite so revolting."

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